SUCH was the creature in whose power Gilliatt had fallen for some minutes.
       The monster was the inhabitant of the grotto, the terrible genii of the place-a kind of sombre demon of the water.
       All the splendours of the cavern existed for it alone.
       On the day of the previous month when Gilliatt had first penetrated into the grotto, the dark outline, vaguely perceived by him in the ripples of the secret waters, was this monster. It was here in its home.
       When entering for the second time into the cavern in pursuit of the crab he had observed the crevice in which he supposed that the crab had taken refuge, the pieuvre was there lying in wait for prey.
       Is it possible to imagine that secret ambush?
       No bird would brood, no egg would burst to life, no flower would dare to open, no breast to give milk, no heart to love, no spirit to soar, under the influence of that apparition of evil watching with sinister patience in the dusk.
       Gilliatt had thrust his arm deep into the opening; the monster had snapped at it. It held him fast, as the spider holds the fly.
       He was in the water up to his belt; his naked feet clutching the slippery roundness of the huge stones at the bottom; his right arm bound and rendered powerless by the flat coils of the long tentacles of the creature, and his body almost hidden under the folds and cross folds of this horrible bandage.
       Of the eight arms of the devil-fish three adhered to the rock, while five encircled Gilliatt. In this way, clinging to the granite on the one hand, and with the other to its human prey, it enchained him to the rock. Two hundred and fifty suckers were upon him, tormenting him with agony and loathing. He was grasped by gigantic hands, the fingers of which were each nearly a yard long, and furnished inside with living blisters eating into the flesh.
       As we have said, it is impossible to tear oneself from the folds of the devil-fish. The attempt ends only in a firmer grasp. The monster clings with more determined force. Its effort increases with that of its victim; every struggle produces a tightening of its ligatures.
       Gilliatt had but one resource, his knife.
       His left hand only was free; but the reader knows with what power he could use it. It might have been said that he had two right hands.
       His open knife was in his hand.
       The antenna of the devil-fish cannot be cut; it is a leathery substance impossible to divide with the knife-it slips under the edge; its position in attack also is such that to cut it would be to wound the victim's own flesh.
       The creature is formidable, but there is a way of resisting it. The fishermen of Sark know this, as does any one who has seen them execute certain abrupt movements in the sea. The porpoises know it also; they have a way of biting the cuttle-fish which decapitates it. Hence the frequent sight on the sea of pen-fish, poulps, and cuttle-fish without heads.
       The cephaloptera, in fact, is only vulnerable through the head.
       Gilliatt was not ignorant of this fact.
       He had never seen a devil-fish of this size. His first encounter was with one of the larger species. Another would have been powerless with terror.
       With the devil-fish as with, a furious bull there is a certain moment in the conflict which must be seized. It is the instant when the bull lowers the neck; it is the instant when the devil-fish advances its head. The movement is rapid. He who loses that moment is destroyed.
       The things we have described occupied only a few moments. Gilliatt, however, felt the increasing power of its innumerable suckers.
       The monster is cunning; it tries first to stupefy its prey. It seizes and then pauses awhile.
       Gilliatt grasped his knife; the sucking increased.
       He looked at the monster, which seemed to look at him.
       Suddenly it loosened from the rock its sixth antenna, and darting it at him, seized him by the left arm.
       At the same moment it advanced its head with a violent movement. In one second more its mouth would have fastened on his breast. Bleeding in the sides, and with his two arms entangled, he would have been a dead man.
       But Gilliatt was watchful. He avoided the antenna, and at the moment when the monster darted forward to fasten on his breast, he struck it with the knife clenched in his left hand. There were two convulsions in opposite directions-that of the devil-fish and that of its prey. The movement was rapid as a double flash of lightnings.
       He had plunged the blade of his knife into the flat slimy substance, and by a rapid movement, like the flourish of a whip in the air, describing a circle round the two eyes, he wrenched the head off as a man would draw a tooth.
       The struggle was ended. The folds relaxed. The monster dropped away, like the slow detaching of bands. The four hundred suckers, deprived of their sustaining power, dropped at once from the man and the rock. The mass sank to the bottom of the water.
       Breathless with the struggle, Gilliatt could perceive upon the stones at his feet two shapeless, slimy heaps-the head on one side, the remainder of the monster on the other.
       Fearing, nevertheless, some convulsive return of his agony, he recoiled to avoid the reach of the dreaded tentacles.
       But the monster was quite dead.
       Gilliatt closed his knife.

book i. the history of a bad reputation.
   I. A Word Written on a White Page.
   II. The Bu de la Rue.
   III. For Your Wife: When You Marry.
   IV. An Unpopular Man.
   V. More Suspicious Facts about Gilliatt.
   VI. The Dutch Sloop.
   VII. A Fit Tenant for a Haunted House
   VIII. The Gild-holm-'ur Seat.
book ii. mess lethierry.
   I. A Troubled Life, but a Quiet Conscience.
   II. A Certain Predilection.
   III. Mess Lethierry's Vulnerable Part.
book iii. durande and deruchette.
   I. Prattle and Smoke.
   II. The Old Story of Utopia.
   III. Rantaine.
   IV. Continuation of the Story of Utopia.
   V. The "Devil Boat"
   VI. Lethierry's Exaltation.
   VII. The Same Godfather and the Same Patron Saint.
   VIII. "Bonnie Dundee."
   IX. The Man Who Discovered Rantaine's Character.
   X. Long Yarns.
   XI. Matrimonial Prospects.
   XII. An Anomaly in the Character of Lethierry.
   XIII. Thoughtlessness Adds a Grace to Beauty.
book iv. the bagpipe.
   I. Streaks of Fire in the Horizon.
   II. The Unknown UnfoldS Itself by Degrees.
   III. The Air "Bonnie Dundee" Finds an Echo on the Hill.
   IV. "A serenade by night may please a lady fair, But of uncle and of guardian let the troubadour beware. Unpublished Comedy
   V. A Deserved Success has Always its Detractors.
   VI. The Sloop "Cashmere" Saves a Shipwrecked Crew.
   VII. How an Idler Had the Good Fortune to be Seen by a Fisherman.
book v. the revolver.
   I. Conversations at the Jean Auberge.
   II. Clubin Observes Some One.
   III. Clubin Carries Away Something and Brings Back Nothing.
   IV. Pleinmont.
   V. The Birds'-Nesters
   VI. The Jacressade.
   VII. Nocturnal Buyers and Mysterious Sellers.
   VIII. A "Cannon" off the Red Ball and the Black.
   IX. Useful Information for Persons Who Expect or Fear the Arrival of Letters from Beyond Sea.
book vi. the drunken steersman and the sober captain.
   I. The Douvres.
   II. An Unexpected Flask of Brandy.
   III. Conversations Interrupted.
   IV. Captain Clubin Displays All His Great Qualities.
   V. Clubin Reaches the Crowning-Point of Glory.
   VI. The Interior of an Abyss Suddenly Revealed.
   VII. An Unexpected Denouement.
book vii. the danger of opening a book at random.
   I. The Pearl at the Foot of a Precipice.
   II. Much Astonishment on the Western Coast.
   III. A Quotation from the Bible.
book i. malicious gilliatt.
   I. The Place Which is Easy to Reach, but Difficult to Leave Again.
   II. A Catalogue of Disasters.
   III. Sound, but not Safe.
   IV. A Preliminary Survey.
   V. A Word Upon the Secret Co-operations of the Elements.
   VI. A Stable for the Horse.
   VII. A Chamber for the Voyager.
   VIII. Importunaeque Volucres.
   IX. The Rock, and How Gilliatt Used It.
   X. The Forge.
   XI. Discovery.
   XII. The Interior of an Edifice Under the Sea.
   XIII. What was Seen There, and What Perceived Dimly.
book ii. the labour.
   I. The Resources of One Who Has Nothing
   II. Preparations.
   III. Gilliatt's Masterpiece Comes to the Rescue of Lethierry.
   IV. Sub Re.
   V. Sub Umbra.
   VI. Gilliatt Places the Sloop in Readiness
   VII. Sudden Danger.
   VIII. Movement Rather than Progress.
   IX. A Slip Between Cup and Lip
   X. Sea-Warnings.
   XI. Murmurs in the Air.
book iii. the struggle.
   I. Extremes Meet.
   II. The Ocean Winds.
   III. The Noises Explained.
   IV. Turba Turma.
   V. Gilliatt's Alternatives.
   VI. The Combat.
book iv. pitfalls in the way.
   I. He Who is Hungry is Not Alone.
   II. The Monster.
   III. Another Kind of Sea-Combat.
   IV. Nothing is Hidden, Nothing Lost.
   V. The Fatal Difference Between Six Inches and Two Feet.
   VI. De Profundis ad Altum.
   VII. The Appeal is Heard.
book i. night and the moon.
   I. The Harbour Clock.
   II. The Harbour Bell Again.
book ii. gratitude and despotism.
   I. Joy Surrounded by Tortures.
   II. The Leathern Trunk.
book iii. the departure of the cashmere.
   I. The Havelet Near the Church.
   II. Despair Confronts Despair.
   III. The Forethought of Self-Sacrifice
   IV. "For Your Wife When You Marry."
   V. The Great Tomb.